To Russia With Love

SARATOV, Russia — American Peace Corps volunteer Kristina Gunnill can often be found at the head of the pack. One of the first foreigners to come to Saratov, one of many cities in the former Soviet Union that had been off limits to foreigners, Gunnill is used to charting new territory.

After scaling the ivy-covered walls of Harvard in the 1970s and becoming one of the first women to earn an MBA there, Gunnill, 48, took Madison Avenue by storm, hurtling along the fast track until she became a vice president at New York advertising powerhouse Young & Rubicam.

But Gunnill, an adventurer who has fond memories of climbing the Himalayas even amid landslides, often does the unexpected.

In 1992, when she was making more than $100,000 a year and was poised to become senior vice president, she walked into her boss' office and announced that she was moving to Russia to become a Peace Corps volunteer.

"I was just sick and tired of the whole thing," says Gunnill. "I wanted new vistas. I was saying, `This is not enough for me. I want more. I need more.' But just at that point, the recession hit, and the economy wasn't ready for more. I sat there and watched the opportunities dry up.

"I was lucky. I didn't have a family to support, and I didn't need to sit there for economic security. I thought, `I don't want to spend my life doing this.' The minute you have that rogue thought, your adrenaline kicks in and at 3 o'clock in the morning, you think, `Oh, my God, I'm going to do it.'

"The Peace Corps was an accident for which I was ready," Gunnill says. "Everything about it seemed right. "

A student of Russian literature for 20 years, Gunnill says: "I've got a gut thing about Russia. It's more than just intellectual interest. There's a heart thing that goes on between Russia and me. And the things that I found fulfilling in my career, while less available in America, were all things that if I did them in Russia would be more helpful to other people.

"If I had continued too much more marching in place, I would have become more and more jaded, more and more cynical. You get into all this trivia, `Who's being promoted next?' `Does so and so earn more than I do?' I enjoyed advertising, but enough is enough. After 20 years, you have to move into the next phase of your life."

Gunnill lives in a cozy apartment in downtown Saratov and, like all volunteers, receives a stipend of less than $10,000 a year, which suits her just fine. Her former salary, she says, was "sinfully high for one individual.

"Frankly, if you're half a human being, by the time you're 40, you ought to start wondering what you're doing to help other people and the world move forward. It can't just be more of the same-more money, more status. It has to be building something."

Gunnill is clearly a woman with a mission. Even on weekends, the Peace Corps Business Center in Saratov, which Gunnill helps run, is bustling with eager young Russians and American volunteers. Everyone seems to be on the go, but they are usually not too busy to stop Gunnill, who calls herself the "gang leader," for a bit of advice or encouragement.

Poised and self-assured, Gunnill radiates energy and loves to throw her coworkers off balance with her offbeat sense of humor. But beneath the easy charm is a woman who is passionate about what she does. Her task, she says, is "to do anything that improves the climate of business." That means helping teachers develop business curriculum at Saratov University, giving lectures on marketing and advertising and finding successful American entrepreneurs to talk to students about how they started their own businesses.

Gunnill also helps American companies find local representatives in this remote city. "People in Russia have no idea about American companies. And out here on the Volga, these companies really don't have a lot of contacts. They need people they can rely on for marketing and advertising."

But Gunnill did not come to Saratov to help American companies peddle their products.

"These companies are training Russians who are going to take that knowledge to Russian companies and use it here. I'm not so much interested in the business part of what I do. I'm here to grow this crop of positive, confident young potential business people. And there are millions of them. There is freshness and an optimism for the future here. These kids know their lives are going to be better than the lives of their parents. What I do is pump my knowledge into people who can then, in turn, train other people."

But Gunnill does more than teach her young charges about business. She has also been known to buy suits for anxious young Russians who came to her in a panic before a big interview with a Western company because they couldn't afford the right clothes. She also persuaded Harvard Business School officials to waive the application fee for a young man without the means to pay.